Julie Doiron / Attack in BlackBroken City, Calgary, AB January 21

Fresh off their recent collaboration on Daniel, Fred and Julie, Daniel Romano brought his Attack in Black band-mates to open for Julie Doiron. Naturally, as the evening progressed, the two acts collaborated with each other more than once.

As expected, when Attack in Black took the stage, their set focused primarily on their latter period identity as a guitar-heavy indie rock quartet. It came as a real surprise, then, when the band indulged a super fan with a performance of an early pop punk number, with said fan on vocals for the whole thing. By not taking themselves too seriously, the band showed a ton of gratitude to their adoring public.

Besides contributing back-up vocals to one Attack in Black song, Doiron stayed hidden behind the merch table for the entire night. But when she finally did take the stage, she was far from the pensive, soft-spoken singer-songwriter she's been known as on previous tours. Instead, she laughed, jumped around and swung her guitar to the beat of her accompanying drummer.

Doiron's set was full of laughter, smiles and ramped-up renditions of several tracks from her latest release, 2009's I Can Wonder What You Did With Your Day, many of which were already upbeat on record but now became scrappy rock'n'roll anthems. When the set did get quieter, Doiron treated fans to material from Desormais, as well as other selections from her back catalogue. However, a major highlight of the set became the impromptu covers of Ladyhawk, the Lemonheads and Willy Nelson, which Doiron and her partner in crime figured out on the spot.

Ultimately, the night proved once again that if the musicians onstage are having a good time, everyone else will too.